Ikan bilis in ice cream? Cool

Ikan bilis in ice cream? Cool

Who would have thought sweet potato and ikan bilis would taste good together as ice cream?

Three students from NUS High School of Mathematics and Science did and apparently so did the judges of a contest to create an ice cream with the best contrasting flavours.

NUS High's Belle Sow and her friends beat nine other school teams on Saturday to win this year's Ice cream Innovation Competition organised by Nanyang Polytechnic (NYP) and Swensen's.

Belle, 14, said their winning recipe was a result of 14 hours of trial- and-error and taste tests in the laboratory and ice cream shops.

"It's fun and quite fulfilling to make your own ice cream," she said. "We even thought of using ginseng and red dates but they were too expensive."

All teams had to work within a $20 budget for their ingredients.

Coming in second in the competition that began last November was Assumption Pathway School's "Warm Harmony", a sweet and spicy mix of ginger and sesame.

Other entries included Bedok South Secondary's wasabi with caramel ice cream and New Town Secondary's "Cheesy ala Thai", a salty-sour-spicy combination of cream cheese, mandarin orange and candied ginger.

NYP School of Chemical and Life Sciences director, Dr Joel Lee, said the contest aimed to raise awareness and get students interested in food science.

But it is not just "masak-masak" or for play, said Dr Lee. "Some of the innovations may be tested and rolled out at Swensen's outlets as part of their new products."

Mr Andrew Khoo, a director at ABR Holdings which manages Swensen's, said the ice cream chain had previously launched mushroom and asparagus flavours as monthly specials. Those flavours came from previous editions of the competition.


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